Page 19 - Fujifilm Exposure_16 Bob The Builder_ok

a team of machines: Scoop the digger, Muck the bull- dozer, Dizzy the cement mixer, Lofty the crane and Roley the steamroller.
They are made of a mixture of aluminium, per- spex, steel, silicon rubber and resin; real miniature pistons are used on Scoop and Muck. Scoop is the most complex character, as producer Jackie Cockle explains: “Scoop has centre-jointed wheels, a cab
that tips forward and back and a full- jointed front scoop and rear bucket.” The machines each cost an aver-
age £7,500 and it took six months to make the first set of machines and puppets. And that was just the start: animation is a painstaking process. On Bob, it takes an average of 12 days to film each 10 minute episode. Four or five episodes are filmed at once, like feature films, and Ball admits she has to be aware of continuity errors.
“We make sure that storyboards have as much continuity information as possible,” she says. “They are our Bible!”
Poschet has her own problems with continu- ity: “As we are shooting with four or more Bolex cameras with a wide range of lenses we have to be sure that the quality (colour, sharpness etc.) is the same so you can mix it later in post-production. Thus you have to record the data of each shot (camera, lens). Because if something is wrong later you have to figure it out.”
There are 36 different sets, including seven per- manent sets, which vary in size from 120 cm x 120 cm to 240cm x 120 cm. In her pre-production prepa- ration, Poschet organised the studio space for these permanently-lit sets, ensuring that each was separat- ed by a black curtain to avoid light from neighbour- ing sets spoiling scenes.
During production she has to read each episode’s storyboard to see if the light needs adjust- ing for late afternoon or night scenes - or even dra- matic effects like lightning. When filming actually takes place, Poschet is no longer needed. She sets the cameras up for shots, and the animators take exposures after making their changes to the charac- ters’ positions.
“As you can imagine, working with four or more animators at the same time, there is hardly time to be around on each set during the actual filming,” she says. “When we started in 1998 we worked with four animators. This means each day we had around 16 different camera set ups to achieve the produc- tion schedule of 12 seconds per animator per day.”
Despite the lengthy filmmaking process, Ball insists that things usually go smoothly. “The only problem for me working on a small scale is that I’m quite clumsy!” she laughs.
“But we’re all pretty laid back. It’s a bit like working in a make believe land. The colours are all bright and happy and the sun is always shining.”
The permanently good weather is certainly one advantage to working on animated films. Poschet has been DP on a number of feature films (“many of them on Fuji film stock which suits the films very well, by the way”) and finds the lack of actors affects her job the most.
“When a puppet sits and stands up in a shot you have to frame it wide enough not to get the pup- pet out of frame. On live action shooting you just move the camera with the actor - I can react to movements of the actors.”
Director Sarah Ball has a simpler answer to how her job differs on live action and animated films: “Puppets don’t answer back!” ■ CLAIRE WILLS
Bob The Builder was originated on Fujicolor Motion Picture Negative